Singer Co

Singer Co. said its board Wednesday agreed to a $1.06-billion takeover of the defense electronics firm by investor Paul Bilzerian. Bilzerian bid $50 a share for Singer, which at first resisted his overtures but gave in when no other suitor emerged with a better offer. Singer shares closed at $49 Wednesday, up 50 cents from Tuesday. Singer said its board recommended that shareholders sell their stock to Bilzerian. Bilzerian and his backers, grouped as Singer Acquisition Co.

The gig: After a long career as one of the country's most influential real estate accountants, Stan Ross is teaching and mentoring college students as chairman of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate. Humble beginnings : Ross was born in 1936 in the Bronx, where he grew up and enjoyed playing basketball on public courts. In high school he found part-time work in a belt factory, and the monotonous labor of cutting belts motivated him to further his education at the City College of New York business school.

Tracy Coley, 38, singer, actor, gospel choir conductor and co-founder of the Amazing Grace Conservatory, died Saturday in Los Angeles of complications after surgery. Born in Atlanta, Coley grew up singing in choirs and earned a music degree at Morehouse College, where he was featured soloist with the Glee Club.

Singer Co. wants to pull out of the sewing machine industry it once dominated worldwide and concentrate on expanding its aerospace and military product lines, company officials said today. Thomas Elliott, vice president of corporate relations, said Singer's board of directors has directed management to investigate the possibility of spinning off its sewing and furniture operations into a separate, independent company. Stock in the new company would then be distributed to Singer Co.

The gig: After a long career as one of the country's most influential real estate accountants, Stan Ross is teaching and mentoring college students as chairman of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate. Humble beginnings : Ross was born in 1936 in the Bronx, where he grew up and enjoyed playing basketball on public courts. In high school he found part-time work in a belt factory, and the monotonous labor of cutting belts motivated him to further his education at the City College of New York business school.

American sewing machine and consumer products maker Singer Co. announced a sweeping restructuring plan, including massive job cuts and the naming of a new president and chief executive. Singer brought back its former treasurer, Stephen Goodman, from a stint at Bankers Trust to be its new president and CEO. He replaces Iftikhar Ahmed as president, who had been with the company for 31 years. The company said Ahmed will remain on its board of directors and serve as a consultant.

Monsanto Co. said Friday that its fourth-quarter earnings rose 1.1%, in line with expectations, to cap a year in which the company moved to shed its remaining chemicals business and establish itself as a dominant force in agricultural biotechnology. Profit from operations rose to $90 million, or 15 cents a share, from $89 million, also 15 cents a share, in the year-earlier period. The results were just short of the 16-cents-a-share forecast by analysts. St.

Singer to Go Public: The company that makes Singer sewing machines is going public again, two years after International Semi-Tech Microelectronics Inc. of Toronto bought it. About 15.5 million shares in SSMC Inc. will be sold at a price of $14 to $16 a share. Proceeds will be used to retire debt incurred in the 1989 buyout.

Paul A. Bilzerian, who rose from humble origins to become a corporate raider and chairman of Singer Co., was convicted Friday on nine counts of securities fraud and tax fraud. The case, which charged that Bilzerian's takeover attempts relied in part on fraud, gave federal prosecutors their first guilty verdict in the chain of big Wall Street securities fraud and insider trading cases sparked by information from former stock speculator Ivan F. Boesky. The others have resulted in guilty pleas or mistrials or are pending.

Singer Co. Chairman Paul A. Bilzerian was convicted today of all nine counts of securities fraud and tax violation in federal court in Manhattan. The panel of six men and six women returned its verdict on the second day of deliberations. The conviction was the first jury verdict in the government's more-than-three-year crackdown on Wall Street crime. The Bilzerian case was indirectly spun off from the Ivan Boesky insider trading scandal. It was the first prosecution of a corporate raider using information derived from the Boesky investigation.

Singer Co. and a former subsidiary were accused by the government Tuesday in a $231-million lawsuit of fraudulently inflating the price of military aircraft flight simulators. The suit, filed by the Justice Department, charged that Singer Co. and Link Flight Simulation Corp. fabricated higher cost estimates to offset price concessions that they might be forced to make during contract negotiations with the Defense Department.

Paul A. Bilzerian, on trial for alleged securities and tax fraud, denied Wednesday that he had false invoices drawn up to hide an illicit trading arrangement with the Los Angeles-based brokerage firm Jefferies & Co. The Singer Co. chairman's testimony came as his defense lawyers struggled to formulate a new strategy in the face of an adverse ruling Tuesday by U.S. District Judge Robert J. Ward. The judge had ruled that if Bilzerian testifies he acted in good faith, believing that he was within the law when he filed allegedly false documents with the Securities and Exchange Commission in 1985 and 1986, then he would give up his right to keep confidential the advice he had received at the time from his own lawyers.

Former brokerage executive Boyd Jefferies said Wednesday that he illegally accumulated stock for corporate raider Paul Bilzerian, who wanted to conceal his stakes in various takeover targets. Jefferies, looking tanned and fit, testified at the trial of the 38-year-old Singer Co. chairman, who is charged with 11 counts of securities and tax fraud, conspiracy and making false statements to the government. If convicted, Bilzerian, a Tampa, Fla., investor, faces a maximum sentence of 55 years in prison and nearly $2.8 million in fines.